WHIPLASH: SC cracks down on cricket's power brokers

It seems the N. Srinivasan era in Indian cricket is coming to an end. The SC has come down heavily on the most powerful figure in the sport, and decreed he will have to choose between leading the Board and owning an IPL franchise.

By striking down the constitutional amendment by which someone could both be a BCCI official and IPL team owner, the apex court has shown the rich and powerful can’t do as they please. Srinivasan has also been debarred from contesting the next BCCI election.

It is a big setback, as he has all along denied there was any conflict of interest. If he has any sense of propriety left, he should immediately step down and not wait for the polls.

But it remains to be seen whether the verdict emboldens the rest of the Board functionaries to be more than mere yes-men for the boss.

With the court decreeing that the BCCI carries out public functions, hopefully it will rid the game of its secrecy and Board politics.

Srinivasan is also the chairman of the International Cricket Council, but the stringent court order can also put that position in jeopardy.

As a former Board president argued, how can he represent India at the ICC if he is nobody in the BCCI?

That the IPL had corruption and vice going on in its underbelly had been suspected for long. Now that the biggest court in the land has found the owners of two teams guilty of betting on matches, the rot has been proven to reach the high echelons of the set-up.

Though the final punishment for Gurunath Meiyappan, Raj Kundra – Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals – will be decided by a committee, one will not be surprised if the two teams are scrapped altogether.

The panel has been given six months to arrive at a decision, and it may result in a lot of intrigue going into the 2015 IPL, in which the two teams can still theoretically participate.

One only hopes the cleansing act under the aegis of the judiciary will rid the sport of the malaise, which has turned off several genuine cricket lovers.